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The definitive "What order should my FX pedals be placed in?" thread


zeuzman

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i still dont know exactly what fx loop is but i heard somewhere that you should put the delay there.

 

I have my delay and whammy in my FX loop. i've tried the whammy before distortion pedals, after pedals but before amp and in the FX loop and it definately tracks better in the loop. as for toneloss, it's in it's own TB loops so all good there.

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i still dont know exactly what fx loop is but i heard somewhere that you should put the delay there.

 

an effects loop inserts the effects at pretty much the last possible stage before they go to the power amp of your amplifier..

 

so if you had a wah effect plugged into your guitar the usual way, plugged that into the amps input and set it to the distorted channel and put a delay pedal in the effects loop, your signal path would look like this..

 

guitar > wah > amplifier preamp (amp distortion and tone settings) > delay > power amplifier (just makes it louder really) > speaker

 

does that help?

 

its useful for having correct delay tails when switching amp channels, and also have you noticed what happens when using reverb or delay that isnt in the fx loop when on a distorted channel? its too loud.. it applies the gain to all the effect, instead of applying the effect to the signal after gain, which is what the loop does.

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not really with the fuzz factory though. it screams dutch radiostations.

 

it's german usually :) plus you can make it do all that without needing a whammy infront... :happy:

 

 

to be honest, you'd have to be a bit daft to buy a whammy when your only option for distortion is a fuzz factory, the two weren't really made for eachother.

 

though if you have a nice valve amp you can turn up, then that'll force it's sound on both pedals (basically that's how bellamy and morello get away with using the whammy in the fx loop, the whammy is never after distortion the whole time)

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an effects loop inserts the effects at pretty much the last possible stage before they go to the power amp of your amplifier..

 

so if you had a wah effect plugged into your guitar the usual way, plugged that into the amps input and set it to the distorted channel and put a delay pedal in the effects loop, your signal path would look like this..

 

guitar > wah > amplifier preamp (amp distortion and tone settings) > delay > power amplifier (just makes it louder really) > speaker

 

does that help?

 

its useful for having correct delay tails when switching amp channels, and also have you noticed what happens when using reverb or delay that isnt in the fx loop when on a distorted channel? its too loud.. it applies the gain to all the effect, instead of applying the effect to the signal after gain, which is what the loop does.

 

 

okay i get it. but in order to do that, amp has to have a seperate input for the loop right?

by the way, my whammy still ruins the sound of ff. and im not a pretentious twat, it's not a small tone loss, when i turn on the whammy, the tone completely changes in a bad way.

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okay i get it. but in order to do that, amp has to have a seperate input for the loop right?

by the way, my whammy still ruins the sound of ff. and im not a pretentious twat, it's not a small tone loss, when i turn on the whammy, the tone completely changes in a bad way.

 

yeah, if you're at all competent with a soldering iron, buy yourself a small metal box, a dpdt footswitch and 4 mono jack sockets, then wire it up to switch the signal either "straight through" or in the "loop." It's not really a loop when you think about it, it's just different jacks ;) If you need a hand working out how to connect it, just PM me! Or if you want I can build you one if you buy the parts :D

 

So anyway, then you plug just the whammy into the loop and leave it permanently on, and press the bypass box switch to turn it on and off! an LED could be put in, but that would require a power supply: it's simpler without. There's also a whammy blender that people make to blend the wet/dry signal if you wanted to do that too.

 

I would suggest don't buy the £40+ one's on ebay (I know Death by Audio do a feedback loop that can be made for well under £20 with virtually no circuit designing for like £90! :eek: ) cos there's loads of people here that can make one for the cost of the parts alone easily :)

 

hope that helps! I don't have a whammy, but if/when I do, I'll definitely build one of those boxes, probably with a blender in too. Phill can probably vouch for the usefulness of it!

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At the moment I have it like this

 

Guitar > Crybaby Wah > DigiTech Delay > MXR Phaser > Amp

 

 

I originally set it up with the Phaser before the Delay but it didn't work, as in, no signal got through to the amp at all....

 

I only tried it twice, so unless it was a strange coincidence (or i somehow managed to leave a wire unhooked), is there a reason for that?

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absolutely no signal? There shouldn't be a reason at all! I can't even think of why that'd happen! :( It could be a power supply related problem, so try running one off batteries if you're currently using one PSU for both, but I'm not certain! :stunned:

 

hmmm maybe there was a loose connection but that's strange that it could happen twice to me lol

 

i don't see how it could be power supply, the order shouldn't effect that i wouldn't have thought, but i'll give it a go anyway.

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lol no, it SHOULDN'T affect it, but it doesn't mean it won't! I'm thinking that it's the only thing that would possibly have an effect by swapping the order, cos otherwise running the broken whatever before or after any others would still cut the signal!

 

yeah that's true, but it would be it'd have to be the Delay with the problem, (there is no problem with the order without the delay) and if the delay was the problem, you'd think it would stop the Wah from working with the setup as it is now...

 

EDIT: AH SHIT, it works, that makes me feel really stupid now, cuz it must mean i did something wrong. :LOL:

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lol don't worry about it :p is it all running off the same psu now too? I bet it was something weird like plugging one of them in after you turned it on or something gay like that! ;)

 

yeah probably... i'm not sure but it's fine now. I'm struggling with 3 pedals and I want to get a lot more ahahaha i'm done for.

 

Nah, maybe the organization of a nice pedal board would solve the problem :stunned:

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well i'd be going something like

Zvex FF > EHX Muff > Small Stone > Small Clone > Compressor > Amp

FX Send > Whammy > Flanger > DD-6 > FX Return

 

I don't know what a sonic stomp is so i don't know where you'd want that, and I'd have the tuner in the whammy dry out.

 

As for your chorus and phaser and flanger, up to you where you think that sounds better, i don't use chorus or flange so i wouldn't know where you'd have that, but i like my phase before my amps distortion but after fuzz so i can have it subtle or full on depending which dirt i'm running.

also i think the whammy tracks a lot better in the FX loop, it's also less harsh, but it losses a lot of the high end definition if you are running fuzz through it so maybe put it before the big muff if you'll be using that through it which it sounds like you might be.

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Well by the end of the week my pedalboard should include the following:

 

Digitech Whammy

ZVEX Fuzz Factory

EHX Big Muff USA

EHX Soul Preacher compressor/sustainer

Ibanez LU20 tuner

MXR 10 band EQ

EHX Small Clone

Boss BF-3 Flanger

EHX Nano Small Stone

Boss DD-6

BBE Sonic Stomp

 

What'd be a good order for this lot then? I've pretty much got most of it nailed I think, but I'm just not really sure a compressor or a whammy should go in regards to fuzz/dist.

 

okay, my opinion then, but as i said, this totally depends on what sound you personally want to make

 

fuzz factory > whammy (dry out tuner) > big muff > small stone > small clone > flanger > eq > dd6 > compressor

 

(i havnt a clue what the sonic stomp is, so i left that out). of course the eq could go anywere, depending what your using it for, nd some people (like me) enjoy compression before distortion, its all totally subjective.

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I'd never use compression before distortion tbh, as distortion adds compression to your signal anyway, so running it deliberately before the dirt seems pointless to me ;) I'd be likely to use it to before other more level dependent effects. I've not tried it, but I imagine that it'd be nice before a whammy (although I'm not sure as it'll add sustain and bring up the level of lower-level harmonics). I sometimes run overdrive after fuzz to compress the fuzz even more but raise the level - increases hum, but adds a little bit of clarity to muddy fuzz imho ;)

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compressors work before whammys certainly, and would no doubt make the whammy sound much better imo, but as i said, its all bout opinion

 

i use a compressor infront of my dirt boxes on my board, and it makes them sound much fuller and brighter, which suits me great;)

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so has anyone played one of those EH memory mans with hazarai? its the blue one. Looks pretty interesting, mainly because it has tap tempo... my favorite thing on planet earth. would it be a good investment to replace my dd-6?

 

I've seen pictures, they do look interesting! Lack of tap tempo is about the only down point of the DMM.

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